This air corresponded superficially with her acquired Calabrian sonorities, from her voluminous title down, but the colourless hair, the passionless forehead, the mild cheek and long lip of the British matron, the type that had set its trap for her earlier than any other, were elements difficult to deal with and were at moments all a sharp observer saw.

The battle-ground then was the haunting danger of the bourgeois.

She gave Mrs.Brookenham no time to resent her last note before enquiring if Nanda were to accompany the couple.
"Mercy mercy, no--she's not asked." Mrs.Brookenham, on Nanda's behalf, fairly radiated obscurity.

"My children don't go where they're not asked." "I never said they did, love," the Duchess returned.

"But what then do you do with her ?" "If you mean socially"-- Mrs.Brookenham looked as if there might be in some distant sphere, for which she almost yearned, a maternal opportunity very different from that--"if you mean socially, I don't do anything at all.